Two separate avalanches killed four Norwegians and one Swiss skier.

Four Norwegian skiers died on Wednesday, January 29, in an avalanche in the French Alps, according to the authorities of the Haute Savoie region.

An avalanche in the French Alps on Wednesday killed four Norwegian skiers swept away by the off-piste torrent of snow and ice, officials in the southeastern Savoie region told AFP.

A British man has died after being swept away by an avalanche in an off-piste sector in the Chamonix valley, at the foot of Mont Blanc.

Four Norwegians and a Swiss woman were reportedly killed in avalanches while skiing off-piste in the French Alps on Wednesday. The Norwegians were part of a group of seven that was swept away by an avalanche in Val-Cenis in the southeastern Savoie region near the Italian border.